Night Shifts
by FrankIeroRules
Summary: Zexion should've known that his relationship with Demyx wouldn't be that easy. When another man comes and tries to ruin what they have, reclaiming the blonde may be more of a challenge than he and those around him thought. Zemyx, XigDem, Akuroku.
1. Chapter 1

Zexion had worked at the same restaurant for years. It's not like he had to stay – he first got a job there to support himself during university, but since graduation had found a day job at the local library, and was even writing a novel.

When thinking about why he stayed, he didn't attribute it to the fact that he could do with more money, or even that he was waiting for his big acting break like a lot of the people dining there assumed. He told himself that he works those night shifts as something extra to do, something social, so that he isn't stuck inside every night.

Of course, this was a complete lie – the type someone tells themself when they _know_ that they're bullshitting themself. He tried not to admit to himself that he stayed to watch the same blonde man perform every few nights.

When thinking of it rationally, he thought of their relationship as the kind where you temporarily fall in love with someone in public. Only that, this wasn't quite temporary.

From what Zexion could deduce of the other, he was slightly eccentric but still very social and optimistic. He played a strange instrument, similar to a guitar – a 'sitar,' as he had overheard one time – and he had this strange hairstyle that would be the lovechild of a mullet and a Mohawk.

And, it actually worked for him.

It was different to everyone else, and Zexion liked different. He felt like he could identify with the other.

Demyx – as he had overheard someone referring to the blonde – would strum his sitar and sing with such devotion, that Zexion had no choice but to admire him for it. Like this one night, where Demyx had been performing a particularly nice song, singing with that same dedication as ever.

Zexion had never thought of himself as clumsy – he wasn't – so he didn't feel the need to watch what he was doing. When the blonde had finished performing, he was so overcome by the urge to talk to him that he dropped what he was carrying after stumbling over something on the floor.

Mentally scolding himself for his stupidity, Zexion knelt down pick everything up, when he saw someone else kneel in front of him.

Who was blonde. With the same hairstyle as Demyx.

And, as he had just noticed, eyes the colour of the sky. He was instantly relieved that was currently summer.

But he was startled as the two picked everything up, wordlessly, and disposed of the mess in the kitchen. They exited the room, but went no further, when the blonde man broke the silence.

"I've been watching you a lot. You've worked here for a while."

"...Oh." Zexion mumbled, with his eyes to the ground. Normally, he would be creeped out by someone saying that to them. But this was Demyx who was talking to him, so he didn't actually care.

"And I've seen you looking back at me, too!" This caused the lilac-haired man to panic slightly.

"What?" Zexion didn't know how the other could be so cheerful and confident when he was almost breaking into a sweat out of nervousness.

But it wasn't that Demyx was overconfident – he was just good at reading people.

"My name's Demyx." He said with a wide smile, extending a hand to the other.

"I know." Zexion said, and mentally slapped himself. "I mean, I didn't know? Uhh. I know now."

"And you're Zexion." The other said with a chuckle, which made Zexion relax a bit.

"Okay, so I did know _that_ one..." he replied with a sheepish smile. Then, "Wait, how'd you find that out?"

"I uhh... Asked around." Demyx said, as if choosing words carefully.

"Oh... Well..." Zexion tried to think of something to say, when Demyx suddenly leant forwards and planted a short kiss on his lips. He noticed the slight ruffling of his pocket, but this was just a passing thought as the blonde man smiled widely and walked off.

When checking through his pockets for his keys, he only found a piece of paper, remembering how it had rustled when Demyx kissed him. With excitement, he hurriedly pulled it out and saw a mobile number written there.

* * *

**Edit:** I've gotten requests to continue this, so... yep. If you've got any ideas you want me to use, let me know, and I'll see how it goes. Also, the pickpocket idea was by writesinthunder.

I'd love to know what you thought, thanks for reading! :)


	2. Chapter 2

Zexion decided that he really had to congratulate Demyx for the idea of taking his keys and leaving the number. As soon as he had discovered it, he rang the number to find a very nervous man on the other end.

"Hello?" Demyx asked, and Zexion briefly thought that this was what it would sound like if you were babysitting in some horror movie, and you answered the phone to one of those mystery calls.

"Hey, Demyx. It's me. Zexion." He felt slightly giddy.

"Hi Sexion!" Demyx pretty much squealed. "I mean, Zexion! Sorry!"

"Sexion. That's interesting." He nervously laughed, "You know, when I got home, I noticed that I couldn't find my keys..."

"Oh, yay! I was hoping it would work! I'm so glad!"

"Yeah..." Zexion sighed wistfully, then realised that it was completely out of his personality to act like this. He reminded himself of a teenage girl. Or even worse... a teenage fan-girl – he shuddered at this thought.

But then he wondered if Demyx had any fan-girls. Would there be anyone for him to have to compete with?

After exchanging addresses, Zexion drove to the other's apartment and made his way to the door. He nervously panicked and paced past the door a few times, when it unexpectedly swung open.

"Zexy!" Demyx threw himself at the shorter boy. "I knew it was you!"

"Uh." Zexion was dumbstruck. "How...?"

"Well, I _might've_ been waiting at the door and saw the shadow through the bottom..."

"Oh." So he was pretty cluey, which automatically gave him points in Zexion's opinion. "Well, I'm glad that my pocket's so easy for randoms to go through."

"So now I'm just some random to you?" He gasped with mock-hurt.

"Hate to break it to you..." Zexion smirked, then his expression changed to a much more serious one and he said, "of course not!"

"I'm glad!" the blonde laughed. "Now come in!"

They entered the living room, and Zexion was surprised to find someone occupying the couch already.

"Oh! This is my roomie, Axel! We've been best friends ever since we were young!" Demyx exclaimed happily, and Axel smirked.

"So this is the famous 'Sexy Zexy' that I've heard so much about, hey?" He had a smile to rival that of the Cheshire cat, and Zexion immediately decided he liked him. "The name's Axel; got it memorised?"

"Hey there, Axel."

"Well, I was going to drop over by Rox's, you know, give you two some privacy." He winked, then stood up and grabbed a jacket. "I'll talk to you more later, Zex. Nice to meet you."

Zexion said bye as the redhead left the room, however he didn't hear the door clicking.

"By the way, you can sleep in my bed if you're staying over, Zex!" He heard from the doorway."Just as long as you don't like, jizz in it or something, you know. I mean, who knows what could happen with you two alone in a room?"

"It's okay, I'm sure I can restrain myself for one night!" He called back and heard a laugh just before the door was shut.

He looked over at Demyx, who looked extremely happy and like he was about to explode or something.

"Is that like, his boyfriend or something?"

"Nope. Not _yet_. But he has the cutest crush on him! And I'm like, 150 percent sure that Roxas likes him back." Demyx replied cheerfully.

"Oh, I see. And why do you think that?"

"Well, apart from having an amazingly accurate gaydar, they're both so couple-y around each other!"

Zexion laughed, then something occurred to him. "Wait, is Roxas short and blonde with a twin brother called Sora?"

"Yeah! You know him?"

"Sort of. My brother Riku's like, best friends with Sora, and the three of them hang out a lot."

"Oh! That's so cool! You should ask Riku about who Roxas likes, you know. Do you talk to him a lot?"

"Yeah, we talk most days on the phone. And sometimes meet up and talk. Although a lot of the time, he comes to see me when I'm working during the day."

"That's nice of him!"

"Yeah. He's still in college. Almost finished, though." Zexion smiled at Demyx's expression, which could only really be summed up with 'oh my god!'

"He sounds cool. Hey Zexy, is that your natural hair colour?" The blonde furrowed his eyebrows.

"What? Yeah, why?"

"Oh, just wondering. It's like... slate coloured? It's not very common."

"Yeah, Riku's hair's a sort of... silvery white colour."

"Oh. Well, I like your hair! It's very nice." Demyx smiled.

They talked about a lot of things, like Demyx's music career. He was going to perform at various bars the next few nights, and he convinced Zexion – without much effort – to come see him tomorrow where he would play at one of the bars he performed at.

Demyx was 22, trying to get his big break, and prided over being one of the only people able to pull of his faux-Mohawk hairstyle. Zexion was 24, working two jobs and had was now wondering if he counted as a groupie now.

They talked for a while, until they realised it was just about midnight, and Demyx convinced Zexion – who wasn't at all unwilling – to stay the night. There were two beds in the apartment, and Zexion accepted Axel's offer of sleeping in his bed. It was more out of courtesy than anything, as he didn't want to seem like a perve just wanting to get into the blonde's pants.

While lying there, in the overly quiet room, Zexion heard the rustling of sheets, but shrugged it off as Demyx stirring. However, when he heard the other walking across the room and into his bed, he felt surprised, but reasoned that the other wasn't going to try anything funny on him; this unexpectedly brought on a mix of disappointment and relief.

"Zexy?" Demyx mumbled tiredly, snuggling up next to the other.

"Yeah?" He replied, unsure what to do. He realised that he had never actually shared a bed with someone, so this was new territory for him.

"Does this make us a couple now?"

"Uh." Zexion didn't know why he felt self-conscious about the question. He didn't want to seem over eager, or make it rushed, but also didn't know why it mattered how it came across. He opted for the safer answer, in his opinion: "It makes us whatever you want us to be."

"So, yes? Yay." Demyx replied with as much enthusiasm as one possibly could at one in the morning while trying to go to sleep.

Zexion chuckled softly in response, and soon the other fell asleep against him. He didn't fall asleep for a while, happily thinking that, hey, there was a talented blonde man who wants to actually be with him. He felt slightly less manly about being a whole head shorter than the other, but ignored this and managed to drift into sleep about an hour later.

The two were woken up suddenly in the morning, as Axel came walking into the room.

"Rise and shine, you two." The redhead walked loudly over to the window and opened it, letting more light shine into the room.

"Axel!" Demyx whined, "it's... early."

"No it's not. It's 9 am. You've got to meet that guy in an hour about playing in the bar thingy." Axel raised his eyebrows, and as soon as the time was mentioned, Zexion bounded out of bed in a hurry.

"Oh crap, I've got work in half an hour." He realised that he didn't actually have anything but his phone and keys to gather, and put his shoes on quickly.

"Need a lift?" Axel asked, and Zexion accepted gratefully. By this time, Demyx had entered the main room, and walked tiredly up to the slate-haired man, not saying anything. Axel detected the need for privacy between the two and left after saying, "I'll just uh, be in the car!"

"Sorry I have to go." Zexion mumbled.

"It's okay. 'Cause I'll see you tonight!" He remembered about seeing Demyx play tonight. "You _do_ remember, right?"

"Of course I do! Should I come here first?"

"Yeah, okay." Demyx smiled, and with a hesitant step forward, gave the other man a hesitant kiss on the cheek. "Bye."

Zexion smiled with slightly flushed cheeks, said bye and left to go meet Axel in the car and leave for work.

* * *

D'aww. This chapter's a bit of a filler, more to establish stuff, really. The drama's going to start in the next chapter, though. But I'd love to know what you thought of this one. Did it drag on at all or something? Thanks a lot for reading! :D


	3. Chapter 3

Working at the library that day was especially long for Zexion. Barely anyone was there that day, so he spent the time mulling about the previous day and glancing at the clock frequently, until he heard someone call his name. Head snapping up, he saw his brother, Riku, casually walking over to the help desk he was sitting at, attracting a bit of attention.

"Hey, Zex, how's it going?" He said, running a hand through his silver hair.

"Hey, alright." Zexion smiled, glad for the distraction. "How 'bout you?"

"I'm pretty good, myself. Where were you yesterday?"

"At a friend's house... why?" Zexion bowed his head slightly, subconsciously covering it with his slate hair.

"Oh. You didn't answer your phone." The silver haired man pursed his lips thoughtfully, eyeing the other. "And which friend would that be? You look like... you're blushing."

"Just, um. A friend called Demyx. I met him yesterday."

"I see. And what were you doing with Demyx?" A grin was starting to spread across his lips.

"Just, you know, stayed at his house... Talked..."

"Aw, Zexion had a sleepover!" Riku teased affectionately.

"Hey! For your information, I spent quality time in bed with another man!" Zexion exclaimed indignantly, despite the grin threatening to take over.

"What?"

"Don't worry, we were fully clothed." Zexion grinned up at the other, leaning back on his chair.

"...Dry sex?"

"Nope, nothing like that. We just, you know, got to know each other." He blushed, flicking his lilac fringe to the side.

"Well, I'm sure you got to know each other _very well_, in bed."

"Pfft. You're just jealous 'cause I got a man of my own." He decided to change the subject. "Anyway, what'd you call about? How're mum and dad?"

"They're good. We were talking yesterday, and we think it's time I moved out." Riku crossed his arms, thinking about the best way to explain to the other.

"...How do you suppose you'll do that with no job?"

"Well, that's why we thought it'd be easier if..." Riku smiled encouragingly at the other. "I moved in with you."

"...Oh." Zexion thought about it. He didn't have a problem with each other – the two had been especially close over the years – and he had enough money, so why not? "Sure."

"Really?" His brother raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Thanks!"

"I mean, you'll have to bring your bed and the rest of your stuff, but yeah. It's fine."

"Thanks so much, Zex!"

"You're welcome."

The two continued to plan it, and chat about what had happen the last few days since they saw each other last. Zexion's eyes flickered to the clock every few minutes, until there were only a few minutes remaining. By this time, Riku was sitting on the help desk, turning slightly to face the other, who was resting his hand in his chin.

Shifting a silver bang out of his eyes, Riku halted when he saw someone familiar enter the building, thinking for a moment before recognising who it was. "Hey look, it's that guy Roxas has been hanging out with lots."

"Hm?" Zexion hummed in a daze.

"I wouldn't have expected him to go to a library, you know." Riku mused, as if oblivious to the way that the other wasn't actually listening to him. "Oh, he's coming this way... Zex?" He waved a hand in front of the other's eye.

"Wh—" Zexion looked up to the person in surprise and said, "Oh, hi Axel."

"Hey, Dem sent me here to pick you up." Axel ran a hand through his red spikes and looked at Riku, as Zexion blushed slightly.

"You two know each other...?" Riku looked at the redhead in bewilderment, then shifted his glance to his brother.

"Yeah, this is Axel." Zexion said, standing up and gathering all his belongings. "He's best friends with Demyx, the guy I was talking to you about. They live together."

"Oh, nice to meet you. I'm Riku." The silver haired man held his hand out to the redhead, who grinned and shook the hand before replying.

"Nice to meet you too, Riku."

Well, I'm gonna leave now. Got to tell mum and dad about the plans. I'll see you later, bye." With a smile and a short wave, Riku left the two men and walked out of the library.

"So, how was work?" Axel asked, as they made their way to his car. "Anything extra interesting happen?"

"Nope. How was your day? D'you know how Demyx went in the interview?"

"Pretty good." There was a click as the car was unlocked, and the two climbed in. "Yeah, he got it. But he's going to meet these people who are interested in joining a band with him. He's gonna see them tonight, and he wants us two to come as well... That is, if you haven't already got plans?"

"No, no, it's fine."

"That's great, he'll be pleased." Axel grinned, before scowling slightly. "There's this one dude, though, I'm gonna keep an eye on him. Dem told me about him, and, well... I don't trust him."

"...Oh? Why not?" Zexion had a suspicion that if Axel didn't like him, he wouldn't either. He felt a bit uneasy at the prospect of something bad happening to Demyx, but tried to reason with himself that it was just him being overly suspicious.

"He just sounds... Sleazy? But the kind of sleazy that doesn't care about the person, just about getting them as a challenge."

"Oh."

"Yeah... but, oh well, we'll get to meet him tonight." The redhead shrugged, looking at Zexion while turning the key in the ignition and driving off.

**...**

"Hey, Zex! You came!" Demyx exclaimed as soon as Axel and Zexion walked through the apartment door. They had gone to the latter's apartment first for him to change clothes and get a few things, before coming here to be attacked with hugs from the happy blonde. "I missed you."

"You too." Zexion's reply was muffled into the other's chest – he mentally cursed his height – and the blonde let go as Axel spoke.

"So what's the plan?"

"Well, we're going to have dinner first before going to meet them all, so..." Demyx trailed off thoughtfully, before his face lit up. "Who's good for pizza?"

"Yeah, that should be fine." Axel replied and Zexion agreed.

Half an hour later, the three were driving to the bar, Demyx rambling with nerves. "Ugh, do you think they'll like me? What if they don't? What if they don't actually want to make a band wi—"

"Dem, shush." The redhead smirked, looking in the rear-view mirror at him.

A few minutes later they parked close to their destination, getting out of the car and walking the rest of the way. Demyx had somehow gotten over his nerves and was now excited, his mouth contorted into a wide grin.

They soon met up with two people – Xigbar, a man with a pony tail and an eye patch, and Marluxia, a rather flamboyant man with pink hair and piercing blue eyes. Demyx happily introduced Axel, Zexion and himself, and the group of five happily chatted for hours, getting drinks and dancing in between.

Axel was still suspicious of the sleazy-sounding man – who they both realised must have been Xigbar – and when he was alone with Zexion, the two getting drinks for the them all, he said, "So, what do you think of Xigbar?"

"I... don't really know." The two watched said man, and the way he interacted with their blonde friend. "I don't like the way he looks at Dem. It's... creepy."

"Neither." Axel agreed, giving the bartender money. "Marluxia didn't seem too happy about it either, maybe he's done it before and it ended badly or something."

"But then why would they still be friends?"

"...Good question."

At that moment, the bartender intervened, giving them their drinks. They took them back to the others without another word on the subject.

**...**

In the early hours of morning, when they started to leave the bar, Demyx and Zexion were standing together outside the building, holding hands and chatting, when Xigbar decided to step in an interrupt.

"Hey, you two." He smirked, momentarily narrowing his eyes at Zexion, and Demyx grinned.

"Hey, Xigbar."

"Have fun tonight?" Zexion tightened his hold on the other, standing up straighter. Xigbar's eyes flickered down to look at the two entangled hands and leaned against the wall.

"Yeah! It was great, we should do it again some time." The blonde said, oblivious of the competition between the two.

"Yeah, we should. D'you know where the other two went?"

"Oh, they must still be inside. Actually, I'm going to look for Axel, you two stay here." The blonde said before walking off, leaving the other two alone.

"So, you and blondie there, hey?" Xigbar smirked down at him and crossed his arms. After Zexion gave a hostile nod, he said, "He's pretty cute, isn't he..." Xigbar pretended to be thoughtful, and the other could feel irritation welling in the pit of his stomach. "And innocent..."

"Don't even think about it." Zexion said coldly, starring daggers at the other.

"And why not?"

"Because, he's... with me. He won't like you."

"Oh, really?" Xigbar laughed patronisingly, and Zexion subconsciously curled his hands into fists. "Well, I've always loved a challenge." With a wink, Xigbar turned on his heal and walked back in to the bar, leaving a defensive Zexion to angrily reflect on what had just happened.

* * *

Did it drag out too much? I got a bit paranoid about all the dialogue, but oh well. Feedback is greatly appreciated! But I hope you like this chapter, thanks a lot for reading! :D

**Disclaimer:** The characters belong to Square Enix.


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